fault lines
by courfeyracs
Summary: Of love's uneven remainders, our lives are fractions of a whole. —-The Next Generation in thirty three ways. / #1: Teddy/Victoire.


**notes: **this is a collection of every het, non-cousincest next generation pairing imaginable for the _captaining the next gen armada_ competition on the next gen fanatics. for the five potter/weasley boys, they will be paired with an oc of my own creation. there will be thirty three chapters in total (if i complete it, that is) so hopefully you feel like you can stick it out until then!

i'm saving my four major otps until last — dominique/scorpius, lucy/lorcan, dominique/teddy and lily/teddy — and after each chapter is finished i'll put a note of which pairing i'm writing next so you can check back for updates if it's one you like.

and finally, i'll say this just once for the entire collection but if you are going to add this to your favourites/alerts then i would really appreciate a review along with it because i love hearing what you guys have to say!

**pairing:** teddy/victoire  
**word count: **2433

* * *

flowers and silence

_was made the first to laugh  
charmed but the weather broke me sober  
i've never been colder_  
-—sneaker pimps

* * *

He meets Victoire, properly meets her, when she is twenty one and lonely and he is twenty three and maybe not quite as lonely in some ways but even lonelier in others. She looks terrible that day: blonde hair limply hanging past her shoulders, skin sickly pale, sunglasses covering up what are surely prominent dark shadows beneath her eyes. The first thing he notices about her is that she stands apart from the crowd. Everyone is seated, dressed in sombre blacks and charcoal greys, the men in button downs and the women in expensive dresses. But Victoire, she stands far, far behind them, up a slight hill and dressed in ripped jeans and a deliberately torn black and white striped shirt reminiscent of prison uniform. Her fingers are desperately clutching at a cigarette like it's her lifeline.

He had no idea the perfect Weasley girl smoked until now. It's the first thing in a long line of things he doesn't know about her.

She looks formidable standing like that, with her back against a tree and smoke falling from her bright red lips. Almost dangerous. But sad, too, Teddy thinks. Definitely sad.

The small, grey-haired man at the front is speaking dully. In the front row, a woman is sobbing. Teddy glances around before slipping out of his chair (he always chooses the end seat in case he needs to make a quick getaway) and down the aisle between the chairs. Hopefully people will just assume he was close to the girl and couldn't take it any more. It couldn't be further from the truth.

He makes his way over to the girl by the tree. Victoire doesn't even spare him a glance, just keeps smoking her cigarette. They stand there in silence for a while, watching the scene below them. Teddy can almost feel her thinking, _is that Teddy Lupin?_ and,_ why is he standing next to me?_ and maybe, _I want to be alone_. But Teddy thinks that's wrong. Call him naive but no one should be alone when they're sad.

After what seems like an eternity of them standing there and listening to the man in black robes drone on, she turns to him. He glances round at the sudden movement, looking at where her eyes would be but all he sees is his reflection in her glasses. It's disconcerting not to be able to see her eyes — it makes her much more difficult to read.

"Teddy Lupin," she drawls. "What are you even doing here?"

Teddy just shrugs, tugging the cigarette from her fingers and putting it to his mouth. He breathes in then holds it away from his face. "You looked sad."

"It's a funeral," she points out. "But I'm not exactly wailing with grief."

"I know," he says. "You looked sad in a different way."

She stares at him and purses her lips before taking her cigarette back. "So you decided to come over. Well, thanks," she says sarcastically. "It's doing me wonders. I feel so much better already after your condolences. Now, if you don't mind—" She drops the cigarette and stamps it out. "—I'm leaving. Show's over."

She turns to leave but Teddy catches her hand. He says, "You don't need to do that."

"Do what?" She faces him again and raises her eyebrows but doesn't pull her hand from his grip like he was expecting her to.

"Go on the defensive like that," he says. He bites his lip, wondering where Victoire's line is and how far he can cross it before she slaps him. "It's not. I mean. You just." He stops and takes a breath. "I know what it's like. To be left alone like that. You don't have to put up walls."

For a minute, he's not sure if she's going to hit him or hug him, but she does neither. Instead, she fixes him with another long look and says, "We're not even friends, Teddy. We've never been friends. Why are you doing this?"

Teddy shrugs. "I don't know. I just think maybe you need to be with someone you're not close to right now. Maybe that would help."

"Are you offering?" Victoire asks sardonically, crossing her arms.

"No of course not. That's what this is all about," Teddy replies, matching her stance. "Well done, Victoire. Ten observation points for you."

She scowls. "You've just talked yourself out of embarking on your little rescue mission."

"Why are you still standing here, then?" he challenges.

Victoire lets out a hiss of breath and turns her head to the side so she's no longer looking at him with her dark glasses. "I'm telling you this now, Teddy. I don't need to be saved. I'm _fine_."

"Okay," he agrees easily.

She scowls again briefly before pulling out a scrap of parchment and etching her address onto it with her wand. She thrusts it at him and, taken by surprise, he takes it. "My address," she explains. "Floo me or don't. I don't care either way."

But she's smiling, Teddy thinks, as she flounces away.

/

Teddy met Victoire when he was two and she was a newborn. He had taken one look in her cradle at Shell Cottage, scrunched up his nose and said, "Ew, what is that?" And then baby Victoire had cried and cried and Harry had to pull Teddy away to make her shut up. They met frequently after that for the next ten or fifteen years as they were the oldest two of the Potter-Weasley clan (though Teddy wasn't _really_ one of them, however much he liked to pretend he was) but they never interacted very much. Teddy was jealous that the younger children looked up to Victoire more, even the boys, and Victoire was jealous that Teddy was the oldest. They thrived upon childish rivalries that carried them through to adulthood, and so, before now, Teddy had never really had a full conversation with her.

He maybe sort of regrets that now, knowing how petty it seemed not to interact with someone because you were seething with jealousy over not being liked as much as them.

But, he reflects, that's the way of the world.

Victoire sits opposite him, fiddling absently with a bottle of wine. They're in her flat, a coffee table away from one another. Her couches are bright white and Teddy can see himself spilling red wine all over it if he's not careful. Victoire, however, Victoire has had these couches for two years and hasn't spilled a drop of anything on them. Her entire flat is the same. It looks like something out of an ideal home magazine.

The silence between them reverberates. Victoire is deliberately not looking at him, acting more interested in the bottle held loosely between her fingers. A half empty glass sits in front of her and she lets out a sigh as she fills it back up. Finally, she looks at Teddy and holds the bottle out for him to fill up his own. He shakes his head. He's already had two glasses and he doesn't fancy stepping into the Floo network with more than that in him.

They stare at the walls some more until Victoire suddenly breaks the silence.

"Sorry."

Teddy glances up. "What?"

"Sorry."

"Yeah, I know," he says. "But... what for?"

"I don't know why I asked you to come," she says, eyes fixed once more on the coffee table.

"Oh." He doesn't know what he was expecting. Maybe, _sorry for being so quiet_, or, _sorry for not making much of an effort_, or even, _sorry for being so sad_.

She bites her lip. "I didn't mean it like that."

Teddy just nods.

"I didn't," she insists, putting the wine down. "I meant. Something a bit like. Sorry for dragging you here for nothing. I'm not very good company at the best of times, let alone now. And I – I just." She blinks and Teddy realises she's trying to stop herself crying. "I don't know why I feel like this, so – so horrible. So empty." The glass of wine is back in her hand and she takes a large drink. She drags the back of her hand across her eyes and sniffs. "I hate it, Teddy. I hate it, I really do."

"She was your best friend," he says quietly. "It's understandable, Victoire. No one expects you to be okay. You shouldn't expect it either."

"She _left_ me," Victoire says, tears blurring her voice. "I hate her! Always dabbling with stupid potions. Of course it killed her in the end. Of course it backfired. And," she sniffs again and lets out a strangled sob, "the worst thing is, I always told her it would. But I never – never _really_ considered it, I just—"

"Victoire, Victoire," Teddy says, grabbing her hands over the table. "It's _okay_."

"It's _not_," she shouts, and he sees what's going to happen before it does. Her hand loosens around the glass and it topples, spilling over the pristine white couch and staining it deep red. He hears a sharp intake of breath and realises it was him, realises he's halfway leaning across the table as if to try to catch the glass that is now rolling slightly on the floor with only a few drops of wine left clinging to the sides.

They look at each other for a long moment and then Victoire laughs slightly hysterically. "No use crying over spilled wine, right?"

Teddy hesitates before giving in to what his mind is screaming at him to do. He gets up and slips into the empty space beside her, wrapping his arm around her waist. Victoire stiffens for a moment before relaxing into him and letting her head rest against his shoulder. She's beautiful even with reddened eyes and tear tracks, Teddy thinks as he draws her closer.

He closes his eyes and wills himself not to fall in love with her.

/

Teddy Lupin is a hopeless romantic. He discovered this when he had his first proper girlfriend at fifteen, a pretty and popular girl named Allie Dearborn who he fell swiftly for in just a matter of weeks. Back then, she seemed perfect. She had wavy dark blonde hair and bright green eyes and a gorgeous smile that he loved to bring out in her. They dated for eight months and in that time, he took her up the Astronomy Tower at night, brought her out to the Black Lake to watch the sunrise, gave her flowers with cute little notes attached, scrawled snippets of her favourite poetry on the corners of her homework and kissed her goodnight and good morning. They were the power couple of fifth year and at fifteen, he had never been more in love.

Until real life happened, that is, and he caught her cheating with a sixth year. His heart was broken and he moped sufficiently for the month after before he found a new girl to impress, and a new one after her, and another after her. Teddy just loves love, though he may have the worst luck with it.

That's exactly why he tries to distance himself emotionally from Victoire in the following weeks they spend together. She is exactly the type of girl that breaks hearts. He's seen her type before though never quite like this. Never with smiles so bright and wit so sharp and a heart so damaged.

She's fickle too. One minute they're best friends and she's confessing every dark thought she's had and the next she's pushing him away, glaring at him and telling him to fuck off. Then she'll send an owl later that night with just a simple, _I'm sorry_, scrawled onto it in her slim handwriting. Victoire never actually says those words aloud, though. It's just an unspoken rule they have. Victoire doesn't apologise and Teddy doesn't ask too many questions, just takes her as she is, faults and all.

It's been five weeks since Teddy went to her flat for the first time and siphoned wine off of her couch as best he could — cleaning spells will never be his forte. They're sitting on a bench in the centre of London and Victoire is laughing, telling him an embarrassing story that happened to her when she was fourteen. Her hair is blown around her face by the wind, her eyes are shut from laughter and she looks so open, so carefree like this that Teddy is more than definitely falling for her.

/

Today, they're at the graveyard where they first met at Victoire's friend's funeral. The grass is wet from last night's heavy rainfall but Victoire pulls him down to sit with her anyway. She smiles slightly, as though she's relishing in the cold that the damp ground brings.

"Back to where we started," she says, tapping her fingers on her leg. She pulls out a cigarette and lights it with her wand. After taking a long drag and breathing out the smoke, she says, "Do you ever regret coming up to me that day?"

"You shouldn't smoke," says Teddy, reaching out to take the cigarette from her.

Victoire pushes his hand away. "I asked you a question."

"I know you did," he replies.

"So." She smiles wryly, but he swears he sees a hint of sadness in her eyes, like she was expecting more of him. "You do regret it. That's all right. I'd regret it too."

Teddy sighs. "I don't regret it, Vic. How could I regret helping someone that needed it?"

She shrugs. "Why did you hesitate if you don't regret it, then?"

"I just—" He pauses before deciding that honesty is the best route when Victoire is involved. She'll find out the truth in some way anyway. But speaking the words he is about to, he feels horribly exposed, cut open with his heart on display. Like he is saying, _here are my insecurities and my flaws, take them and make of them what you will_, and that scares him. That really, really terrifies him. "I just don't want my heart broken, that's all."

At that, Victoire starts to laugh. He expected her to frown or to shout or to walk away or to tell him that she only sees him as a friend. Laughter was not in his list of predicted scenarios. He looks at her with wide eyes, all deer caught in the headlights, before she finally speaks.

"Teddy, Teddy," she says, shaking her head, still grinning. "You're going to be the one who breaks _my_ heart in the end."

-fin-

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**next chapter:** dominique/lysander


End file.
